Date: 1770

"When Reason invades the rights of Common Sense, and presumes to arraign that authority by which she herself acts, nonsense and confusion must of necessity ensue; science will soon come to have neither head nor tail, beginning nor end; philosophy will grow contemptible; and its adherents, far fro...

— Beattie, James (1735-1803)

Date: 1771

"[T]he fumes of faction not only disturb the faculty of reason, but also pervert the organs of sense"

— Smollett, Tobias (1721-1777)

Date: May 7, 1772

"Conscience, that candid judge of right and wrong, / Will o'er the secrets of each heart preside, / Nor aw'd by pomp, nor tam'd by soothing song."

— Fergusson, Robert (1750-1774)

Date: June 4, 1772, 1773

In the fields "peerless Fancy hads her court / And tunes her lays."

— Fergusson, Robert (1750-1774)

Date: 1773

"But there was a judge in the bosom of Annesly, whom it was more difficult to satisfy; nor could he for a long time be brought to pardon himself that blow, for which the justice of his country had acquitted him."

— Mackenzie, Henry (1745-1831)

Date: 1773

"But he felt not that contrition which results from ingenuous sorrow for our offences; his soul was ruled by that gloomy demon, who looks only to the anguish of their punishment, and accuses the hand of providence, for calamity which himself has occasioned."

— Mackenzie, Henry (1745-1831)

Date: 1776

The ruling passion of an author may be "strongly marked in his writings"

— Mickle, William Julius [formerly William Meikle] (1734-1788)

Date: 1776

"It is this which hath been so justly celebrated as giving one man an ascendant over others, superior even to what despotism itself can bestow; since by the latter the more ignoble part, only the body and its members, are enslaved; whereas, from the dominion of the former, nothing is exempted, ne...

— Campbell, George (1719-1796)

Date: 1777

"Hide me, my friend, from the consciousness of my folly, or let it speak till its expiation be made, till I have banished Savillon from my mind ... Must I then banish him from my mind?"

— Mackenzie, Henry (1745-1831)

Date: 1777

"The love, to which at length I discovered my heart to be subject, had conquered without tumult, and become despotic under the semblance of freedom."

— Mackenzie, Henry (1745-1831)